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- From: jym@mica.berkeley.edu (EcoNet via Jym Dyer)
- Newsgroups: misc.activism.progressive,alt.activism,talk.environment,ca.environment
- Subject: NEWS: "God Squad" Never Saw Key Economic Study
- Message-ID: <EcoNet.14Sep1992.11pm@naughty-peahen.org>
- Date: 15 Sep 92 06:53:38 GMT
- Followup-To: talk.environment
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- [From EcoNet sc.natlnews Conference]
-
- => Sep 3, 1992 by cdp:econet in web:sc.natlnews
- => God Squad Never Saw Key Economic Study
-
- The U.S. Interior Department "failed to inform" members of the
- so-called "God Squad" -- which voted in May to override the
- Endangered Species Act and allow logging in 13 spotted owl-
- inhabited forests in Oregon -- about a study showing that
- logging would produce little economic benefit, according to
- a report in the Portland Oregonian.
-
- Members of the cabinet-level Endangered Species Committee --
- commonly referred to as the God Squad -- were not given a
- specially prepared economic analysis of proposed government
- timber sales on the 13 Bureau of Land Management forests.
-
- The study -- which showed that logging would boost income and
- employment in the affected counties by less than 1.5 percent --
- was prepared by Interior Department staff specifically to aid
- the committee in its decision. But the study was not included
- in the packets of information given to committee members by the
- Interior Department. Committee members had to request the study
- separately.
-
- An Interior Department spokesman told the Oregonian that some
- members of the committee did request the data. But other members
- of the committee said they never heard of the study.
-
- Under the Endangered Species Act, the God Squad is allowed to
- exempt certain areas from the Endangered Species Act only if the
- economic benefits "clearly outweigh the benefits of alternative
- courses of action consistent with conserving the species or its
- critical habitat."
-
- Alex Levinson, litigation coordinator for the Sierra Club, which
- is suing the Bush administration over the God Squad's actions,
- called the study's findings "further evidence that the God Squad
- decision was based primarily on election-year politics, rather
- than economic or environmental considerations, as is required
- under the law.
-
- "This is a shining example of the administration's desire to
- undermine the Endangered Species Act," Levinson said.
-
- Vic Sher, a Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund attorney who
- represented environmentalists during the God Squad proceedings,
- told the Oregonian that the administration's actions with regard
- to the economic study were "consistent with the manipulation of
- the process that we've seen from the start."
-
- Despite the God Squad decision, the forests may still not be
- logged anytime in the near future due to a federal injunction.
- The injunction affects all Oregon BLM timber sales in spotted
- owl habitat since Jan. 1 of this year.
-
- In issuing the injunction, U.S. District Judge Helen Frye ruled
- that the BLM's environmental impact statements for logging on
- these lands were inadequate -- a violation of the National
- Johnson in the Sierra Club's Northwest office at 206/621-1696.
-